Jessie Prinz speaking at the 2011 Winter Intelligence Conference at Oxford University, hosted by the Future of Humanity Institute

Every morning we wake up and regain consciousness -- that is a marvelous fact -- but what exactly is it that we regain? Neuroscientist Antonio Damasio uses this simple question to give us a glimpse into how our brains create our sense of self.

Nobel Prize-winning physicist Leon Cooper discusses his recent work in the understanding of consciousness from a material point of view. Although there is concern that this might take away from the mystery of life, he quips, "If you tell me what the chemistry is of the digestion of a great wine... it's not going to stop me from enjoying the wine."

Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2011/11/14/Leon_Cooper_Superconductivity__Other_Insoluble......

Superconductivity and Other Insoluble Problems: Are There Limits to Scientific Understanding?

Ariel Garten, CEO and Co-Founder of InteraXon, delivers a Talk at TEDxToronto 2011 on the theme of Redefining Consciousness.

After a catastrophic car accident that left him in a coma, Simon Lewis found ways to recover -- physically and mentally -- beyond all expectations. At the INK Conference he tells how this remarkable story led him to concern over all threats to consciousness, and how to overcome them.

In this talk, Social Media strategists and developers Rome Viharo and Maf Lewis reveal the likelihood that Google's search algorithm may already be sentient, what it means, and what it represents as a metaphor for collective problem solving.

Mentioned are Egypt 2.0, Revolution 2.0, Guillermo Arevalo, Francois Demange, Daniel Dennet, Francis Heylighen, The Shipibo of Peru and Ayahuasca.

Wikileaks, Anonymous, Facebook, Wikipedia, 4chan, Reddit, Stumbleupon, Google, Rene Descarte, Dualism, Global Brain movement are also referenced in the talk.

Daniel Dennett is Fletcher Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts University.

Here Professor Dennett lectures on the philosophical obstacles to understanding consciousness. This lecture includes topics covered in detail in his wonderful books "Consciousness Explained" and "Sweet Dreams: Philosophical Obstacles to a Science of Consciousness".

Imagine if you were completely conscious but couldn't move or speak? Neuroscientist Adrian Owen has been using brain-imaging techniques to detect consciousness in patients who are presumed to be vegetative, sometimes for many years. By giving simple commands and then measuring brain activity, Owen has learned some patients are completely aware despite being entirely unable to communicate or move their limbs.

Hofstadter—who won a Pulitzer for his 1979 book, Gödel, Escher, Bach—blends a surprising array of disciplines and styles in his continuing rumination on the nature of consciousness. Eschewing the study of biological processes as inadequate to the task, he argues that the phenomenon of self-awareness is best explained by an abstract model based on symbols and self-referential "loops," which, as they accumulate experiences, create high-level consciousness.

Twenty years after it topped the bestseller charts, Douglas R. Hofstadter's Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid is still something of a marvel. Besides being a profound and entertaining meditation on human thought and creativity, this book looks at the surprising points of contact between the music of Bach, the artwork of Escher, and the mathematics of Gödel. It also looks at the prospects for computers and artificial intelligence (AI) for mimicking human thought.